Over the last few days, I've started to experience (again) USB Stream and FIFO errors, and with it the occasional "tick" or "scratch." This used to happen to me earlier whenever I turned on LED lights or dimmers. I installed a dedicated circuit for the audio system, and the LED lights stopped bothering me.

Recent changes are Blaxius^2, and some rearrangement of cables to accommodate the fatter B^2. Not related to SFS settings. I've rebooted several times, disconnected and reconnected the Lush^2. Still occurs, and now even with LED lights out.

Wondering if anyone has ideas to try. Big distraction from fully listening to B^2, etc.

I don't think so. I will try it, but I do not think it is related to Blaxius^2. My guess is that somehow in moving equipment and cabling around, I may have introduced some new factor: there are some places where power cords and Blaxius^2 run parallel for a few feet. Maybe this? I will do some further experiments in the next few days. It is exactly what I saw happening with LED lights after I switched to Lush from Clarixa.

there are some places where power cords and Blaxius^2 run parallel for a few feet. Maybe this?

Yes, that surely can be. Otoh, often this is unavoidable and undoubtedly I have that too. So I don't know ...Hard to give the real hints, except for excluding that it can be the new interlinks which imply the situation. And btw, *if* they would be the cause, then it would go away when you power off the speakers, right ? but only switch them off when you are used to that hence know how to do it (may sound daft to others, but you'll know what I mean). And speaking about that ... can't this situation be so since the happening you had the other day (2 months or so back) ?

And never underestimate how critical each of the USB cable-connections (3x) are to the DAC. So don't hesitate to push them in more tight ...

And having said the latter, why wouldn't it be so that it is just that ? I mean, those interlinks are vastly in the way now and quite a bit more than before. Also, now you can power off speakers what you want, it is not going to help. Exchange with the original Blaxius is also not going to help. So ... that has to be it ? How did you route the lot (what goes over which etc.) ?

Setting the USB buffer to 4 ms seems to have fixed the errors. Not sure if anyone else has experienced this. I will try other values, and back to 16 ms. Maybe this is just placebo, but the SQ is even more astonishing. More soon.

Last week after having read Ramesh's and Peter's posts on the USB buffer setting to 4ms I gave it a try. What a nice surprise I had. I immediately noticed a somewhat more relaxed sound with a decrease in the noise around the notes. Clarity is improved and it makes the listening even more enjoyable. It's not a transformative tweak but it definitely is an improvement to my ears.

Yesterday I did a reboot of the Mach III before a listening session. Track after track I was not fully satisfied with what I was hearing. This sometimes happens. I looked at the XXHE settings and all was ok. And suddenly I remembered the USB buffer. So I opened the Driver interface to find that the setting was back to 16ms. I put it to 4ms and voilà, last week's sound was back.